Missteps Can Be Fatal To Gop

CONCORD, N.H. — This state is littered with the errors of Democratic presidential campaigns of times long past. The Republicans haven't learned a thing from them.

Right now, the Republicans hold the whip hand in American politics. They control both houses of Congress; they control the national debate. The political battles are being fought on their turf.

And so why, at perhaps the high point of the GOP ascendancy, does the leading Republican presidential contender actually lose trial heats with the weakest presidential incumbent since William Howard Taft?

For years the Democrats suffered for being a congressional party, not a presidential party. For all of their discipline and direction on Capitol Hill, they were feckless when it came to campaigning here in New Hampshire's capital. The disease--often debilitating, sometimes fatal--must be contagious.

Here are some of the Republicans' symptoms:

The party is entering a presidential campaign with a front-runner whose campaign is built on the tissue of endorsements.

The last time that happened, former Vice President Walter F. Mondale of Minnesota not only lost the New Hampshire primary, he very nearly lost the nomination. He recovered enough to prevail at the San Francisco convention--and to lose every state but his own in November.

Now, three months before the New Hampshire primary, Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole of Kansas has virtually replicated the strategies used by Mondale in 1984 and Edmund S. Muskie in 1972.

Here in New Hampshire, Dole has the endorsements of the governor (Stephen E. Merrill), one senator (Judd Gregg), both members of the House (Charles Bass and Bill Zeliff) and a popular former senator (Warren B. Rudman). In Iowa, he has the endorsements of the governor (Terry E. Branstad), the lone GOP senator (Charles E. Grassley), two Republican House members (Jim Ross Lightfoot and James A. Leach) and 27 state legislators.

It's harder to imagine the ordinary voters who will support him; indeed, in this state, according to the New Hampshire Poll, Dole's lead is down to 10 points. The next-leading contender: Patrick J. Buchanan, whom almost no one thinks can win the nomination. "Dole's hope lies in making his nomination seem inevitable," says Andrew E. Busch, a University of Denver political scientist. "The minute it's not inevitable, he's in serious trouble."

The Republicans have allowed their campaign to be shaped by a litmus test.

For a generation the Democrats simply wouldn't countenance a nominee who opposed abortion rights. The new Republicans won't permit a nominee who supports them. Gov. Bill Clinton's pirouettes on abortion at a Democratic straw poll in Florida four years ago were as agonizing to watch as they must have been to perform. He conformed. So did the major GOP candidates who spoke to the Iowa Right to Life Committee this month.

A year ago, Sen. Phil Gramm of Texas strained to avoid talking about abortion. But at a news conference at the Iowa event, he was booming, "I am pro-life"--and then he suggested that, unlike Dole and President Clinton, "I'm not trying to reinvent myself." Buchanan stated the obvious: "All three candidates who are pro-abortion are out of the race."

At a time when the president offers an unconvincing "stay the course" message, the Republican front-runner counters with "steady as she goes."

Like Mondale, Dole has a great virtue--his steadiness, a remarkable fact given his penchant for remarks that helped sink the 1976 GOP ticket and sealed his demise after losing here to George Bush .

Right now, however, that's about all he has. "He hasn't screwed up," says Bass, who is a freshman House member..

But a presidential nomination and a general-election victory are truly amazing rabbits themselves. Dole and the GOP haven't pulled them out yet.